It's All And Then It's Nothing
by TurnOfTheWorld
Summary: There is always something he can't identify, something between them, something preventing this thing, and it resides in the space he's quite sure should be his. Drabble.


She touches him. Most of it is indirect, though, and that's what kills him. She flattens his lapels, or tugs on his sleeve, or presses her fingers into his forearm. Or lets her head, occasionally, drop to his shoulder, but not really. There is always fabric between the two of them. He feels cheated.

Later, when there is no fabric, he still feels cheated. He presses himself very close to her. There is always something he can't identify, something between them, something preventing this thing, and it resides in the space he's quite sure should be his.

There are no clothes and they are very close and he presses, presses, and presses harder, and maybe it'll hurt them both, and then they'll have that between them, too.

* * *

><p>She flirts with other people in front of him. He pays it no mind as she has her games and he has his. But, sometimes, when she's in the middle of it he'll catch Ressler's eye, or Aram's, or Meera's, or — <em>Christ <em>— even Cooper's, and make it perfectly clear that Lizzie's got no interest in any of them, that it's just her pretending not to have an interest in Red.

There are times, though, that he does pay it some mind. She belongs to him in a way most people will never understand, and despite any sense of self he has left, they belong to each other and it's at such a price that he won't let her forget. Mostly, how he deals with this is by fucking her so hard she'll feel him for days.

* * *

><p>Lizzie leaves traces of herself wherever she goes. Usually, it's minor disturbances: Malik with a little smirk, Ressler's desk "definitely not how he left it," or times when Aram is laughing, shaking his head like Lizzie stole his voice, and that he'd gladly let her keep it.<p>

Other times she is more devious. That's when he loves her the most, he thinks, because Lizzie isn't always nice and her smile isn't permanent. People don't know that about her and secrets do have a way of making men feel powerful. At her most wily, she's kissed him on the mouth in full view of _anyone she goddamn feels like_, tucked her favorite pair of panties into his suit pocket, and written filthy phrases on the lid of his coffee cup.

It isn't often, but she's flinched when he touched her, and when she's particularly vicious, she's left him before he's woken up.

* * *

><p>Her body is a dangerous secret. She is graceful in the sense that she's comfortable with herself, the way she fills out a shirt or a pair of pants. An argument could be made for her undercover clothes, but her heart just isn't in those types of clothes, the kind that make her feel like she's helpless, flat on her stomach and wearing another person's skin.<p>

He knows her body and it's marking by degrees, finds himself in the space between her elbow and her fingertips, the position of her body relative to his own.

* * *

><p>Her voice is at times hoarse, wanton, even informative, and there's something in it that settles under his skin, making a space for itself. She will sometimes whisper as if everything she's relaying is a delicious secret, and maybe it is, because he can never keep himself from moving closer, leaning into her.<p>

Up and down, down and up, her voice raises and lowers depending on how he's touching her or how she wants to be touched. He has trouble discerning between the two and all his movements are in an effort to catch up to her. There is no word to describe her laughter, the way it makes his hands fidget and the muscles in his thighs tremble.

She has wept and chuckled and growled in his presence. She's screamed, her fists hitting his chest like pebbles while all he could do was hold her, and she just screamed and screamed. Every noise that came from her took something that mattered away from him. It was a new feeling, as he'd killed men before, but never stuck around to _really _watch them die.


End file.
